On August 18, 1864, Union General Ulysses Grant sent his Fifth Corps, under General Gouverneur Warren, to the Weldon Railroad, an important rail line connecting Richmond, Virginia, with Wilmington, North Carolina, the South’s only remaining Atlantic port. As such, it was a major supply line for the Confederate army, and Grant believed that controlling it was key to cutting off Petersburg, Virginia. An offensive just two months earlier to accomplish the task had failed. Warren’s mission was to sever the Weldon Railroad and take control of it.
The Fifth Corps began doing just that early in the morning of August 18, not only rendering the railroad inoperable, but also doing it in such a manner that Confederate General Robert E. Lee would know without a doubt who had done it. After heating the rails, the men of the corps twisted them into crude versions of a Maltese Cross, the insignia of the Fifth Corps.
Warren’s troops came under fire from a small Southern battery later in the day, and in prolonged fighting the Federals took nearly 1000 casualties by day’s end, nearly three times as many as the Confederates.
The fighting resumed the next morning, with Confederate General William Mahone pushing his troops between Warren’s right flank and the left flank of the Ninth Corps, splitting the Union line and taking more than 2,500 prisoners. Mahone’s actions went for naught, however, as the Union remained in control of the Weldon line at the end of the day after receiving badly needed reinforcements.
Heavy rains the next day saw both sides hunkering down, but Mahone launched another attack on August 20. However, faulty intelligence led Mahone to hit the Union at its strongest point, and the Union held control. In the three days of fighting the Union army had 4,279 casualties against the Confederate army’s 2,000, but continued to hold their position. Warren’s control of the railroad forced Lee to put together a patchwork plan to offload supplies from Wilmington at a point some 18 miles from Petersburg, then haul them by wagon to the besieged town. The Union would hold the railroad line for the test of the campaign.
By James Gindlesperger, historical author
Solomon Joseph Hottenstein was born in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, on May 5, 1844, to Henry and Magdalena Samell Hottenstein, the fourth of five children in the family. As he grew, he became known as Little Solly, a nickname that appears to have stuck with him into adulthood. When he enlisted, his last name was misspelled “Hottenstine” – once he received the Medal of Honor, that was the name recorded into history.
On August 19, 1864, he was with his comrades from Company C of the 107th Pennsylvania Infantry at the Weldon Railroad. As part of this regiment, he had already fought at Cedar Mountain, Second Bull Run, South Mountain, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, North Anna River, Cold Harbor, and Petersburg, as well as several smaller skirmishes and the pursuit of Robert E. Lee’s army following the Battle of Gettysburg. Needless to say, he was no longer a stranger to battle.
On that fateful day the 107th Pennsylvania, part of Colonel Peter Lyle’s Brigade, General Samuel Crawford’s Division, Fifth Corps, was working its way through the dense underbrush south of Petersburg, Virginia. The regiment was on Warren’s right flank and took the brunt of Mahone’s move between the Fifth and Ninth Corps, and some 300 of Lyle’s Brigade were surrounded and taken prisoner, Hottenstein among them.
Assembled under the watchful eyes of a North Carolina regiment, Hottenstein realized that the prisoners were being held in a location where he had foraged just the day before, an area he was familiar with. Desperate to avoid going to a prison camp, he decided he could take advantage of the confusion among his captors as the fighting continued to rage around them.
Shouting that the Federals were mounting a counter attack, he rushed toward the rebel flag bearer and ordered him to relinquish his colors. Hottenstein’s bluff worked, and the baffled flag bearer surrendered his prize and watched as other Union prisoners followed Hottenstein’s lead, taking several of the North Carolinians into custody.
With visibility limited by the smoke of battle, Hottenstein led his prisoners, numbering more than 100, to the Union line, where they realized too late that they had been duped. Hottenstein handed them over, along with his captured flag, to General Crawford.
Hottenstein was rewarded with a promotion to corporal, and on February 2, 1865 he received the Medal of Honor for his heroics. His citation read, “Captured flag belonging to a North Carolina regiment, and through a ruse led them into the arms of Federal troops.”
He was awarded a furlough, but before he could take his leave he was wounded in the hip at Hatcher’s Run on February 6, 1865. He would suffer from the effects of the wound for the rest of his life.
Following the war, he returned home and married Rebecca Clark. The two would have seven children before moving to Manassas, Virginia, in the 1880s. There, he purchased a farm that sat partially on the old Manassas battlefield. He died on May 24, 1896, at age 52 and was buried in the Manassas Cemetery where, ironically, he was once again surrounded by Confederates.
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